Shared Truths
by Dren-the-Chocolate-Cow1
Summary: This is a bit of an original story I made up, but it's kind of based off of X-men: Evolution. A small group of mutants end up getting together and following out a mission given to them, as well as avoiding a group of folk trying to either kill them, or ex
1. Default Chapter

Along through the alleyway I ran, panting and gasping for breath like a dog on the chase. Only problem was I was the one being chased. I could hear the thudding of footsteps behind me. I turned my head to look over my shoulder, but only to see the shadowy herd of figures growing closer by the second.  
  
Seeing this burst another dose of adrenaline into my veins.  
  
Why don't they just leave me be, I thought to myself as I pushed my speed to greater limits. This, however, was no use. I soon felt a hard metal chain wrap around my ankles, causing me to stumble and trip, then fall to the floor, landing hard on my side.  
  
I silently cursed myself and curled up into a defensive ball as I thought about the wretched ways of this planet...  
  
My name is Isabella Danielle Shanfel, although I've only called myself Izzy. Most times the name I give out is replaced by nicknames, such as 'circus escapee', 'lab rat', 'genetic mistake', and most commonly 'freak'. No matter how crude, or bashing these names were, they were also quite precise and descriptive.  
  
I, Izzy Shanfel, am a freak. Of nature, of science, who knows?  
  
My heritige is hawaiian, so my skin and hare are both a dark shade of brown. At the time I'm telling you about, my hair had been hacked off to chin length. For only fourteen years old, I was quite mature in body as well as mind. I wasn't really muscular in any way, but my build was still trim and slender.  
  
Seems perfectly normal, right? Well, I've left out a few 'minor' details.  
  
My eyes are such a pale shade of green they almost appear white, all depending on how close or far you were when looking into them.  
  
Odd, yes. But something like that can't possibly make you a freak? Of course not! My eyes are intersting. The thing that made me od was the long, green, bullwhip-like tail that grew from my tailbone.  
  
I'm not too sure how my tail came to be there, but my parents would tell me I was born with it. That being a logical enough explination, I grew to belive it.  
  
Speaking of family, I should explain my history to you as well. Or what I knew of it at least. I had a mother, father, and sister. Fairly normal. My dad worked at as a bank clerk. My mother, an author. My sister was the same exact age as I was. We were twins. Identical. Almost. Only differences were her eyes were a brown-black, and she had no tail.  
  
We all lived in the city of Chicago, Illinois. My parents both moved up there from Hawaii. Why, I don't know. I never bothered to ask. My sister and I had always gone to the same school, Edison Elementary. That is, till we graduated into Junior High. Then we went to the Crestside Eagles Junior High.  
  
She stayed. I left.  
  
You see, I was always being poked fun at because of my tail. In this world, no one appriciated people different from them. In the ways I was, I mean. Think back to the days before African-American rights. How the black children would be treated. Now magnify that tourment about twenty times. That's how I was treated. Seeing how I was never one to back away from a fight, or let someone trod all over my rights and dignity, I would fight back. Physicly. I would be suspended all the time. I finally got expelled for breaking a kid's leg. Sent to Juvinille Hall. Got in trouble there too. It was much worse, the kids were less dignified and loved to brawl. So I got kicked out from there as well. Soon enough, I decided that that was enough of that.  
  
I went to live with my uncle, who was a chef in Miami. Sure, it was fun while it lasted, but I got terribly homesick. Missed my parents and my sister. So I went back, to find my reality had been shattered. My parents had transferred, and must have thought they told me so in some way or another. So I was left out on the streets to fend for myself.  
  
Luckily I was quite capable of myself, having grown up in a downtown, rough-housing neighborhood. Theivery quickly became one of my experties. Which is where this story comes in.  
  
I was about to bust into the same store this group of people was. They must have been big-time 'freak haters'. They caught one glimpse of my tail and started to chase. Catching up to my story, I ran, got tired. They tripped me, I fell.  
  
I was jolted out of the defensive ball I had made of myself by a heavy blow to the back. It must have been a kick, judging by how hard the thing that hit me was, and the strength behind it. My eyes widened and my back arched as a response to the pain.  
  
Before I could move, I felt myself being rolled onto my back and weight being settled onto my abdominal area. I had opened my eyes in time to see a flash of metal, which was followed by a sudden, burning pain by my right shoulder. I yelled out in agony and writhed about on the ground under the weight of the man, who must've been in his late teens.  
  
I opened my eyes all the way and glared into the face of my attacker. He was caucasian, tall, and had obviously bleached his hair. He narrowed his brown eyes at me and made a motion to slap me across the face, but I automaticly brought my arm up and blocked his hand.  
  
This must have angered the man, because he shouted something to his comerades, which I had earlier noted there were five of, and they surrounded us. One set of hands firmly held my wrists above my head. Another two pairs of hands grabbed onto the shins of either of my legs and pulled them apart.  
  
Oh my god, no!  
  
Fearing violation of some sort, I started to squirm and twist around. My tail was whipping about like a vicious snake, and I ended up hitting one of the teenaged, rebel men across the face.  
  
Now I had done it. Pushed my luck to the maximum. Easily enough told, because one of the remaining men had caught onto my lashing limb and held it firmly to the ground.  
  
I re-opened my eyes and tilted my head upward, trying to see what these monsterous men would do to my lower section. All that I managed to glimpse was the blond-haired, brown-eyed man that was sitting on me hold his knife in one hand and shift his weight about ontop of me.  
  
I was about to lean foreward and attempt biting him, but a hand clasped over my mouth and pushed my head back against the ground. I winced slightly and closed my eyes as the back of my skull bumped into the cement floor below me. I opened my eyes to see the face of a hispanic male about three inches from my own. Judging by the way he was leaned over from the direction my head was facing, and how his hands were occupied, he must have been the one restraining my arms and head.  
  
I let a low growl escape my throat as he leaned down and muttered into my ear, his fingers digging into the side of my face.  
  
"Hey, freak. We're going to do you a favor and chop that bit of sushi attached to your ass off." The hispanic man's voice was thick with an uptown accent. Seeing how he didn't smell of his own grime, he must have just come tagging along with a friend, or relative of some sort. Soon enough, I abandoned the details ebbing into my mind and thought of the facts. They were going to chop off my tail! That, to me, was the same thing as loosing one of my legs.  
  
The man on my abdomen scooted backwards till he was sitting on my thighs, then the small group started whooping. I had no idea what they were getting so excited about, but I knew for a fact it couldn't be good.  
  
Soon enough I felt a carress on the inside of my upper thigh that sent a shiver up my spine and throughout my body. This sensation was followed by my muscles tensing up and the feel of a steaming hot liquid dripping from where the touch had come from. It took me a moment to figure out what had happened, that my leg had been cut. I layed there, helpless, pinned, and bleeding, waiting for the group to grow bored of this little game and leave.  
  
That hope was shattered by the feel of the metal blade tracing around my tail. The icey cold, metallic touch threw me into a state of sheer panic. I didn't want to lose my tail. I couldn't! So with a buck of my hips and a kick from my legs, I broke the grip on my left leg and caused the blond caucasian to tumble off of me. I jerked my arms upwards, ultimately axehandling the hispanic between the legs, a blow that caused him to teeter over onto his side, groaning and holding himself.  
  
My torso now free, I pulled up into a quick sit and slammed a fist into the face of the man holding my leg. Then the group all stood and ran a few feet from me before turning and whipping out guns.  
  
Wasting no time, I scrambled to my feet and bolted down the alley away from the men. Gunshots rang in the air, I could hear them richochetting off of objects, feel them wizzing through the air around me. I felt one bullet graze my shoulder, but that didn't stop me.  
  
Another talent I have neglected to mention. I've always been able to jump higher and further than humanly possible. This was a gift I took pride in and used quite often.  
  
The knowledge that I couldn't outrun the bullets brought me to greater heights of bravery. I turned and jumped to the side, landed with my feet against the wall, then flipped backwards and landed at a crouch, facing the group of men that had stopped shooting.  
  
I ran back over towards the gang, lept up into the air and soared over the heads of the men, knocking one over by a blow to the face from my tail. When I had landed, my feet were already running. While the men stood there in a stunned silence, I ran from the alley and down the sidewalk, slowwed slightly by the pain in my leg.  
  
That didn't hinder my will to live, however. Not in the least bit. I ran till I reached a bus station. I stepped inside the virtually abandoned building, glanced about, then carefully layed down on one of the hard, stiff benches, and fell asleep straight away. 


	2. Izzy's Entrance - Part Two

My eyes fluttered open against a ray of sunlight shining through a large window and onto my face. That, however, wasn't the only thing that roused me from my sleep. The other factor was a dull, throbbing pain in my shoulders and back.  
  
With a small groan, I rolled over, moving from laying on my stomach to laying on my side. Pulling an arm free from under my torso, I reached up to my face and rubbed at my eyes using my wrist. After clearing the gunk from my thrat, my eyes wandered over towards the wall across from me and settled upon a clock. Half past noon. Close to the normal time I woke up nowadays.  
  
Letting a large yawn flow up through my lungs and out my mouth, I swung my legs off the bench and placed my feet on the floor. My eyes moved from the clock to my thighs, and from there to my feet. I stared at my sneekers for a minute, blinked, then shook my head and looked back up and over to the front desk of the bus station.  
  
There was no one up front. Slightly surpised by this, I rose to my feet and streached my arms up above my head, as well as my tail, except it moved straight out instead of straight up.  
  
It must be a holiday of some sort, I thought dismissively to myself as I walked towards the door of the station. My tail swayed gently behind me, completely independent of my thoughts, as I pressed my palms against the cool, smooth glass of the door.  
  
I stepped outside the door only to lean back against it once I was outside. My eyes trailed along after a car that drove by. It was pretty nice looking. A shiny, lime green Volkswagon. Following up from the car, which had already disappeared over a small hill, my eyes settled themselves upon the view of the sky. I stared at it for a moment, then chuckled, shook my head, and started walking up the sidewalk to where a cafe I knew about was.  
  
It would rain about five times a day, where I lived. In Hawaii. For some reason this just amused me. I had been living here for a while now, simple because I liked being near the ocean better than when I was living inland. I always felt stranded and lost when I was too far away from the sea. At least there I could place myself on a map inside my head and know where I was.  
  
I walked up to a glass door and stopped, then turned and looked at it. There was a picture of a foaming, steaming cup of coffee in white, and print under it reading "Harmino's Coffeehouse Best." I stared blankly at the picture for about a minute or two, imagining how great it'd be to have a nice, steaming mug of coffee with me right now. Sadly, that wouldn't happen. Couldn't blow money on petty things like that.  
  
I walked into the tiny cafe on the corner of the block, eyes skimming the red and white decor. The young woman at the counter glanced up at me, stared at my still-swaying tail for a moment, then went back to cleaning the counter, although I could see her glance up at me every once in a while.  
  
I simply shook my head to myself, then found a vaccent booth by the large glass window at the front of the shop and sat in it. When I sat, my hands strayed to the pockets of my camoflauge shorts. I felt inside them with two fingers, but only found lint.  
  
"Damn the luck." I muttered to myself. Must have left my money in my othe rpair of shorts. Ah well, I could survive without food for a few days. But still...  
  
My eyes moved down to my stomach, where my left hand was rested. I feld my stomach grumble, both from inside and through my hand.  
  
With a small sigh, I gurned slightly in my seat, got comfortable, and stared blankly out the glass window, waiting patiently for night to fall. Night... The one time I could actually get stuff done... Earn money.. get food.. 


End file.
